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There was an instant of calm, and the air became dull and silent,

as if dumb with terror. And the fields of grain, which just

before, bowing to the earth and again shaking their golden ears

on high, had tossed like waves, now stood motionless and gazed at

the sky with bristling stalks. And the green willows and poplars

by the roadside, which, like mourners by an open grave, had been

bowing their heads to the earth, and brandishing their long arms,

with their silver tresses spread out on the winds, now stood as

if dead, with an expression of dumb grief like the statue of

Niobe on Sipylos. Only the trembling aspen shook its grey leaves.